Fence at Y-12 Plant Keeps Anti-Nuclear Protesters Out

By Global Security Newswire Staff

Activists will not be permitted to stage an anti-nuclear protest near the Y-12 site entrance due to security precautions put in place following a 2012 break-in.

The Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance wants to hold a "Names and Remembrance Ceremony" for victims of the 1945 nuclear bombing of Hiroshima on a grassy spot of land close to the entrance of the Y-12 National Security Complex in Tennessee. However, their plans for the Aug. 6 vigil have been stymied by a steel barricade that limits access to the site's front lawn. The fence, originally said to be temporary, was installed in the wake of the July 2012 break-in by a group of elderly peace protesters, the Associated Press reported on Tuesday.

Attempts by the group to get legal orders to tear down the fence thus far have been unsuccessful.

Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance coordinator Ralph Hutchison said he is holding out hope that the National Nuclear Security Administration will decide to take down the fence.

NNSA spokeswoman Rebekah Nwangwa, in an email to the Knoxville News Sentinel, said her agency still plans to construct a permanent fence. "But we've not formulated any specific plans at this time and have not set a schedule for when we intend to pursue the installation of a new fence," she said.

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Due to the security barricade, activist have been staging their protests in an area that faces the Y-12 site's main entrance.

This article was published in Global Security Newswire,
which is produced independently by National Journal Group under contract with the Nuclear Threat Initiative.
NTI is a nonprofit, nonpartisan group working to reduce global threats from nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons.